The importance of training salespeople cannot be over emphasized!
According to research done by the Bridge Group, a sales development company in California USA, annual turnover in sales positions ranges from 20% to 34%.
A recent study by the Society of Human Resource Management, a human resource company based in Virginia USA, estimates that every time a company replaces an employee, it can cost, on average, 6 to 9 months’ salary.
This means that for a salesperson earning R 450 000.00 a year, (R 37 500.00 per month) it could cost between R 225 000.00 and R 337 500.00 in recruiting and training expenses to replace them when they leave. Contact us for effective sales training.
Don’t be too quick to get rid of under-performing salespeople: train them!
A lot of companies I contact tell me that they have an internal sales training department / programme and therefore do not require external sales training.
However, in most of these companies the salespeople are struggling to achieve their sales targets.
This is because the salespeople do not have the necessary “How-to” skills to implement the company’s in-house training. (They don’t know what to say)
And then the reason given by the company and or the salespeople for their poor sales performance is; “It’s the economy”.
It’s not the economy, it’s the salespersons lack of selling skills!
The aim of any sales training should be to change the salesperson’s behaviour, their “sales behaviour”.
But this won’t happen until they improve their attitude and the quickest way to improve a salespersons attitude is to provide them with simple “How-to” skills and techniques that they can use when speaking to or meeting with their customers.
In-house sales training tells salespeople to greet the customer with enthusiasm. So instead of the usual half hearted “Hi, can I help you?” it’s now an enthusiastic “Hi, can I help you?”
It’s still the same bad opening line!
A good external sales trainer, like myself, can provide simple “How-to” skills for salespeople to be able to implement the in-house training.
Example:
Instead of, “Hi, can I help you?”
Rather say, “Good morning, my name is Ray,
- What exactly are you looking for today?”
- What’s the reason you contacted us?”
- What brings you into our store today?”
External sales training should not be seen as something that is going to detract from or replace in-house sales training but rather enhance it.
In most cases in-house sales training focuses on systems and methodologies and very little, if any, “How-to” skills.
This is why so many in-house sales training programmes end up becoming white elephants, something which is expensive and never used.
Effective sales training can take salespeople from being “Average sales reps” to being “Sales professionals”.
Selling is the # 1 skill set in any organization.
No company can exist without sales and no sales can happen without salespeople, well-trained and well-motivated salespeople.
NOTHING EVER HAPPENS UNTIL A SALESPERSON SELLS SOMETHING!!!
Related Tag: Effective Sales Training
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________
© 2019 Ray Patterson. All materials, images and contents contained herein are the intellectual property of Ray Patterson and may not be copied, reproduced, distributed, displayed, adapted or modified without Ray Patterson’s express permission. Any unauthorized copying, reproduction, distribution, display, adaptation or modification will amount to copyright infringement.